By Estelle Shirbon and David Milliken
PARIS/LONDON, March 10 (Reuters) - Precipitous falls in French, British and Swedish industrial output, together with a dive in German exports, painted a bleak picture on Tuesday of Europe's economic performance in the first quarter of 2009.
A dire fourth quarter last year saw Germany's economy shrink by 2.1 percent quarter-on-quarter, its worst result since reunification in 1990. British GDP contracted 1.5 percent and France suffered a 1.2 percent slide.
Economists, who had predicted the last three months of 2008 could prove the low point -- although they said recovery from there would be glacially slow -- are now thinking again.
"Today's industrial data is as bad as it gets," Jacques Cailloux, economist at RBS, said of the French figures. "We have moved from a stage where we thought there were some signs of stabilisation at the start of the year and moved back to a scenario where things are continuing to deteriorate."
France's industrial output slumped 13.8 percent year-on-year in January -- a record annual decline since the series began in 1991, according to national statistics office INSEE.
Britain did little better. Industrial production there tumbled 11.4 percent year-on-year in January, its biggest annual fall since it was deep in recession in 1981. "This horrific outcome points to another chunky subtraction from overall GDP during Q1," said Alan Clarke at BNP Paribas.
Sweden fared worse still. Its industrial output dived 22.9 percent year-on-year while order books contracted 31.9 percent.
Germany's trade surplus narrowed to its lowest level in over seven years in January as exports dived by 4.4 percent month-on-month in adjusted terms, official data there showed.
Germany has been the world's largest exporter of goods since 2003, but the economy's reliance on foreign sales has proved a weakness as global demand for its traditionally competitive manufactured products plummets.
DekaBank economist Sebastian Wanke said recent German data led him to expect a quarterly GDP decline of 1.5 percent in the first three months of 2008.
Jonathan Loynes at Capital Economics said British GDP looked set for "another hefty drop of 1.5 percent or more" in the first quarter.
For France, Tullia Bucco at Unicredit MIB in Milan said her forecast that gross domestic product would drop 0.9 percent in the first quarter now looked too optimistic, and the reality should be closer to the fourth quarter slide of 1.2 percent.
WHAT TO DO?
With interest rates at just 0.5 percent in Britain, 1.0 percent in Sweden and 1.5 in the euro zone there is a limit to what conventional monetary policy can do to ease a recession stemming from the worst financial crisis in generations.
After cutting rates to an all-time low last week, the European Central Bank signalled a further reduction was on the cards but has generally shied away from talk of zero rates.
However, Executive Board member Lorenzo Bini Smaghi was quoted on Tuesday as saying that if the economic situation worsened, the ECB was ready to reduce rates further, "even to zero".
Analysts said Britain's much weaker than expected figures would have little impact on monetary policy as the Bank of England has already cut rates to a record low, and is starting a programme of quantitative easing to boost the money supply.
Sweden's central bank thinks its recession will be the worst since World War Two.
Knut Hallberg, analyst at Swedbank, said the industrial production figures strengthened the view that "the Riksbank will continue cutting rates as fast as possible".
Sweden's central bank is scheduled to decide on rates next on April 21. The European Central Bank will do so on April 2 and the Bank of England on April 9.
Finance ministers from the G20 group of rich nations and big emerging powers meet at the weekend to prepare for a summit in London on April 2, where leaders hope to present a united front in tackling the worst economic crisis in decades.
But differences are evident.
On Monday, Lawrence Summers, U.S. President Barack Obama's chief economic adviser, urged governments to pump more money into their economies to counter recession. That call was rejected when euro zone finance ministers met the same day. (Writing by Mike Peacock; editing by David Stamp)